


The Sphinx's Riddle

by sasha_b



Category: King Arthur (2004)
Genre: Language, M/M, slash.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-07
Updated: 2018-04-07
Packaged: 2019-04-19 23:07:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14247720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasha_b/pseuds/sasha_b
Summary: What walks on four legs at dawn, two at midday, and three at dusk?





	The Sphinx's Riddle

**Author's Note:**

> This is set over the 15 year period that Arthur and the Knights were in Britain.

_Dawn._

In the beginning, there was a young, scared, dark haired boy of 18, atop a too-large charger that pawed the earth, threatening to dump the newly made commander on his ass, dirtying the shining Roman-made cuirass and leather skirts.

In the beginning, there was also another young, dark haired boy, this one 15, eyes too large for his head, curly hair encompassing his face, his angular bone structure so sharp as to cut anyone who got too close.

The commander and the conscript had differing opinions of each other at first. The commander was infinitely fascinated by the other boy – he saw signs of himself in the dark eyes that burned at him from the lines of soldiers in the mornings, and despite their being from different lands, the Roman found he wanted to absorb anything the Sarmatian would tell him of his home. He longed to hear that musical voice speak words other than “yes, commander.”

The conscript hated the commander. He wanted to catch the Roman alone, and either slit his throat silently, the red blood cleansing his hands with its heat, or bash his head in with a rock in front of the whole courtyard so he would then be taken to the hill and hung. At least that way he would be rid of this miserable place, and of the green eyes that kept catching his brown ones staring at them.

The first battle was a muddy, bloody, gritty disaster.

The conscript found his anger could not be checked by ale or by the presence of his comrades, and he located the commander on his knees in the small building that the Sarmatian had never been inside.

The conscript walked up the single row of stone toward the commander, his booted feet quiet, his movements sinewy and silent. He fingered the dagger at his waist. His mouth was full of vitriolic froth – anger and hate ready to spew forth at the Roman whose back was to him. The Roman whose dumb plans had caused the deaths of four of his best friends.

He stopped when he got close enough to the young man to hear his words and see his bent body.

The commander’s arms were spread, and he was staring up at the man that decorated the crossed beams that served as the centerpiece for the building. The commander was sobbing and supplicating and ignoring the snot and wetness that ran down his too-lined face. The conscript hesitated, and listened to the words his commander spoke.

After a few minutes, the Sarmatian turned and made his way on fleet feet out of the building, his mind disturbed and his lip bitten until it bled.

That night he slid the dagger under his pillow, and did not take it when he next met with the Roman.

*

_Midday_.

In the middle, the commander, now a worldly, wise old man of 28, his stallion still white and fearsome and pawing the ground, fought with daggers and swords and anything the conscript wanted to spar with him with.

The conscript, 25, beard finally grown in and hair still messy and flopping in his face, goaded the commander constantly, laughing and teasing and kicking up dust and flitting around the Roman like some lithe woodland spirit the Greeks would have talked of.

The two men would spend hours going over battle tactics, yelling and arguing and disagreeing and then planning again until both of them were sick to death of war talk. They would either then go to the baths or to the tavern and drink until they couldn’t remember the smell of the blood that seemed to follow them – all of them, all of the knights – everywhere.

It was then the commander thought it best to talk of his philosophers and of Rome and how his goals for his _ala_ unit were basic and principled – get the conscripts home. No more death on his hands. He’d be joining Satan in Hell regardless. It was too late for the commander – but by God, he’d make sure the men under his care would see their land again.

The Sarmatian would shout at the commander, both of them drunk, that the commander knew _nothing_ of what the conscripts wanted, knew nothing of how to get them home, and that they would all die on the cold fields of Britain for a cause that the Roman was born to – and one that the conscripts hated with all their might.

It was on one of those middle nights that the conscript dug out his dagger again, and wavering, walked to the commander’s quarters, slipped into the Roman’s rooms, and sat at the edge of the other man’s bed, watching as he slept.  It was an uneasy sleep; the commander frowned and spoke in Latin, words the Sarmatian couldn’t understand, and he cried out once.

He cried out the conscript’s name, and the younger man hesitated, _again_ , and put away his dagger. He reached out a hand and smoothed the groove that lay between the Roman’s dark eyebrows.  The Roman woke. His eyes were hazy and unfocused, but he jerked them immediately to the conscript when he realized he wasn’t alone.

He spoke the Sarmatian’s name again, sleepily confused, and the Sarmatian did something that came purely from instinct, purely from some baser need to _not be alone_.  Or so he told himself afterward, when he lay awake in the commander’s bed, his long limbs wrapped around the stockier ones of the Roman, his body turned to the ceiling, his neck cradling the dark head of the commander in its join of throat and shoulder.

His hands could not stay away from the commander’s flesh; he likened it to a curse or a joke played upon himself – the warm, scarred skin under his fingers felt like _home_.

The conscript had never felt truly safe – not in this land – before.  In the Roman’s bed, in his arms, as the conscript’s body still smarted and complained from the heated and passion-filled joining it had endured, the Sarmatian found a genuine smile on his face. Not a smirk.

He trailed lazy fingers over the commander’s back, finding each scar or mark and remembering it so he would have _something_ when the waited for Woad blade took him from this life.

The commander woke when the sun began to show its head and found the Sarmatian still wrapped around his broader frame, and he stared in wonder at the gift he’d been given.

God would punish him for this sin, he was sure.

But in the early morning light, the planes and hard places on the conscript’s face mesmerized him, and he found he could see all the lines and marks and the few freckles left over from childhood, and he smiled, a great thing that made his entire body fly with the power of his heart. The power that this man had given him to love.

_That_ was not a sin.

*

_Dusk._

At the end, there was the commander, his white stallion somewhat dulled in brightness, but still strong of body and of soul. The commander, 35, his face grooved and tan and grizzled, barked orders for the last – hopefully the last – skirmish, and he rode out onto the battlefield, Excalibur shining, his red cloak flapping in the wind.

The conscript, 32, aged beyond his years, his sharp face sharper than it had ever been, was one of six knights left, and still fought and planned and bickered with the commander.

He hadn’t shared the commander’s bed in a while – and it was always at the back of his mind, always niggling him and rolling around in his tired and world-weary brain.  He would never admit it, but the conscript _missed_ the Roman’s bed. He missed the man’s arms, he missed the soft talk and lips and sparkling, bright green eyes on his. He missed the arguments that weren’t the bitter, hateful things they’d become.

But he’d be damned if he acted first.

He was going home in a few weeks, and he’d be damned if he – no. He would take care of himself, just as he had when he was green and scared and alone in the giant Roman fortress where the only things that were familiar were beaten out of him and denied him by force.  He wouldn’t fight for the love that had waxed and waned so brightly he still wasn’t sure it had happened.

The commander was soaking in the baths that evening, Woads controlled again, his knees raised like a child’s so his arms could wrap around them.  He found his mind wandering to the conscript, and to the conscript’s heart and flesh and suddenly he could taste the Sarmatian on his tongue. The commander wept, thick, bitter tears that he’d thought long scalded from his eyes.

He laid his stubbled cheek on his arm, and shut his eyes, and imagined his goal of so many years – the conscripts going _home_ – and then wondered why the thought broke him instead of bringing him the joy it used to.  He wept silently and didn’t feel the presence in the bath house until the slender body of the other man was next to his, and the familiar arms were around his shoulders.

He wept, and if the conscript wept too, the commander didn’t feel it.

That was alright.

Their dark hair meshed, and their fingers twined, and one felt _safe_ , and one felt _forgiven._

*

At the end, it was just the commander, and the urn of ashes.

The conscript’s swords the commander couldn’t bear to part with, so they were hung in his office, crossed and shining and still wrapped at the hilts with the same well worn black leather that had always been there.

He was an old man now, retired, his son carefully ensconced on the throne. His wife had been gone for five years this spring.  He wasn’t sad, or bitter, but he hadn’t been happy or _free_ in a long time. He was tired and ready for God to take him wherever the damn deity wanted to take him.

He stood at the edge of the cemetery, and read again all the names of the men that he had already memorized.

His last stop was his father’s grave.  He touched the swordless mound, and moved to the thick trees that surrounded the little place.

He walked, and he slowly spread the conscript’s ashes easterly, and he spoke to him, and he cried one last time.

And then he was merely Arthur, and the conscript was finally only Lancelot.

And they were finished.

~

**Author's Note:**

> Another piece I wrote in 2007. I'm rather fond of this one. Am editing a bit as I go. Thank you for any feedback!


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